Your Letters: Words that got you through a hard time
Do you have words that soothe you in times of grief? Do they inspire you? Do they mirror your suffering? In what ways do they comfort you?
Last week Shad spoke with Dr. Lucy Kalanithi about the role of literature in her husband's life as he was dying. She shared his required reading — Being and Time by Martin Heidegger, Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis and Cancer Ward by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn — so we asked you to share yours. And you shared in droves.
In addition to the highlights q web producer Fabiola Carletti read on today's show, here are a few more submissions that caught our eye.
A hybrid reading and playlist based on your submissions:
- Nocturne: On the Life and Death of My Brother by Helen Humphries
- You are a Masterpiece by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
- The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder
- The Crossfire Series by Sylvia Day
- Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom
- As Once The Winged Energy of Delight by Rainer Maria Rilke
- Psalm 121
- Love, we must part now by Philip Larkin
- On Being Human by Al Purdy
- Demain des L'Aube by Victor Hugo
- Pedestrian Verse by Frightened Rabbits
- Pacing the Cage by Bruce Cockburn
- When the roll is called up yonder I'll be there (hymn)
- Carrie and Lowell by Sufjan Stevens
- 3 Little Birds by Bob Marley
- Crossing the Bar by Rani Arbo
Sarah via email
I survived a lot of abuse and abandonment as a child. It's left me with a deep loneliness that surfaces every once in a while, regardless of how many people I have in my life who love me. It's an easy well to fall into and hard one to climb out of. During one of my trips down the well that had gone on for several days, I went to a bookstore to distract myself. I picked a poetry book at random, opened it to a random page, and read As Once The Winged Energy of Delight by Rainer Maria Rilke. It showed me that I can use the strength that I have earned — somewhere down in me — to step toward the world and be a part of it. My debilitating fear and loneliness was not the world and not my life. There are also many more messages that reach me through that poem. It was just what I needed to not only get out of that well, but to accept and appreciate why the well was a part of me.
Sean Weeks (@scybolt) via Twitter
Evelyn Vogel via Facebook
Two and a half years ago, six days after my mother's funeral, my husband, then 49, had a heart attack. He had an emergency angiogram, angioplasty and a stent placed in his coronary artery. Three days before this, two close family friends also passed away. The day of his heart attack, we heard a busker sing Bob Marley's 3 Little Birds at The Forks in Winnipeg. Later that night, that song came to me when I couldn't sleep, and for a few moments it brought me a sense of peace. "Don't worry 'bout a thing, cuz every little thing's gonna be alright."